The present invention relates to a juice extractor which can extract juice from fruits or vegetables to make fruit juice or vegetable juice.
Recently, as people's interest in health is on the rise, there is a high tendency that they will directly extract juice from the vegetables, fruits, grains or the like using a juice extractor and take the extracted juice at home. The development of household juicers to which this trend is reflected is in continuous progress.
As one example of juice extractors, Korean Patent Registration No. 793852 discloses a juice extractor which employs the principle of rubbing, pressing and crushing raw materials over a grater. Such a juice extractor makes soybean milk from soybeans and makes fruit juice from tender fruits having a high viscosity, such as tomatoes, kiwis or strawberries using a low-speed squeezing and grinding method. In addition, the juice extractor does not require a large space in using or keeping the juice extractor in custody as a housing thereof is vertically coupled to an upper side of a drive unit. Moreover, the raw materials put into the juice extractor are naturally moved downwardly. Thus, since the juice extraction speed is relatively high and the juice remaining phenomenon does not occur, juice can be promptly extracted from various kinds of vegetables or fruits.
Meanwhile, draff from which juice has been strained is discharged to the outside through a draff outlet port of a housing via a mesh drum discharge hole formed at a bottom surface of a mesh drum. In this case, when raw materials (e.g., salaries, pineapples or the like) having a relatively long, tough and fibrous texture are put into the juice extractor, a problem may occur in that the draff does not easily escape from the mesh drum discharge hole fluidically communicating with the draff outlet port but is hanging caught between the bottom of the mesh drum and the mesh drum discharge hole, and thus the draff remains in the mesh drum. Likewise, in the case where the draff is caught in the mesh drum discharge hole, it is difficult for the draff itself to escape from the mesh drum discharge hole in terms of a discharge structure. Consequently, the draff continues to be accumulated between the mesh drum bottom and the mesh drum discharge hole, and thus blocks off the mesh drum discharge hole. For this reason, the draff is not smoothly discharged through the mesh drum discharge hole, thereby deteriorating a juice extraction efficiency. In addition, a problem occurs in which raw materials which are put into the juice extractor and the draff which is not discharged are entangled with each other, so that they are accumulated upwardly inside the mesh drum, leading to an increase in loss of the raw materials and making the washing of the juice extractor troublesome and inconvenient.